Perfume & Promises
by Maureen Painted Green
Summary: The storm raged outside the window, and tomorrow both of their lives would change forever, but for tonight, all that mattered was this. Booth and Brennan react to events on the eve of Max Keenan's trial.
1. Trials & Tribulations

**A/N:** Not really a songfic, but the song kind of defines the mood. If you want to give it a listen (which I highly recommend), the name of the song is "Perfume and Promises" by Idina Menzel. This is my take on the trial of Brennan's father, more specifically, what that situation will mean for Booth and Brennan.

_--_

_**Perfume & Promises**_

_--_

_A crack in the smile but she's always in style while she waits_

_Waving goodbye but she's too tired to cry and she's wasted_

_A letter, he wrote but it's far too exposed so he throws it away_

_The sound of regret as it's counting the steps back to safe_

--

Darkness fell over the streets and sidewalks of Washington, DC, and with it came the storms. The city was dark and quiet, tonight DC was just for those that called it home. Though it was only mid-spring, a strong summer wind whipped through the desolate streets, rustling trees and blowing straight the American flags that flew at every monument. People stayed inside and waited. Waited for the storm to begin, for the rains to come. For what tomorrow would bring.

Tomorrow - that's why Temperance Brennan was still at the lab. Because of what would be happening tomorrow. She'd known for months that it would eventually come to this, that her father would eventually be on trial for the crimes that he had committed. He'd allowed himself to be caught for her, Booth said, so he could be near her and be with her. Sometimes, she worried that he had done more harm to her than help. He had forced her to re-examine her perceptions, to re-open a chapter of her life that she had thought closed and to feel all the stitches ripped out of old wounds and relive all the pain that he had once caused. He had changed, and she had to learn how to accept that, how to accept him, and above all how to accept herself. With each new insight into her father's character, new pieces of herself became visible, and with every new part of herself, her vision of the world shifted. No cataclysmic shift, not even a discernable change. Just a tiny amendment that threw her off balance.

All that would be changing tomorrow, for better or (she suspected) for worse. Max Keenan had forced his way back into her life, and she found she was no longer able to be the rational creature. Already, she was becoming his daughter again, a daughter that would not give up her father again without a fight. She had agreed, after much coercion from her father, to testify for the defense. Caroline Julian, who was, coincidentally, the prosecutor assigned to the case, was beside herself. Booth, as the arresting officer would be the chief witness for the prosecution, a position which he was quite obviously not thrilled to be in. Brennan sighed at this recollection and rubbed her eyes. Tomorrow was going to be hell for everyone involved.

Gathering her wits, she tried to turn her attention back to work, but for once she was unable to focus. On every skull, she saw her father's face. At every turn, she heard the voice of an unnamed judge sentencing him to die for the people he had killed. She wasn't sure whether it would be better for him to live or die. She just knew that she could not stand idly by and wait for the sentence.

Life was ephemeral, she decided. No matter how much effort you put in, how much you stuffed into the days and years of your life, it all came down to moments. Moments that defined you, moments that changed you. Moments in which you had to let go. Feeling distinctly unsettled at these thoughts, she rose from her chair. Her blood ran thick with need. Raw emotion coursed through her body, and she felt the need to do something. Not just to do but to _do_, to act so radically that the decision could never be taken back.

She needed something, someone, anything that could make her feel through the numbness that had settled in her bones. She needed to manifest the change that she knew she was on the brink of. She needed something certain in a world where nothing was guaranteed except for death and taxes. Death. The only way to escape that inevitable sentence was to live, if only for moments at a time. Tomorrow was death's day. Tonight, she would cling to life.

She bolted for the exit, not even stopping to grab a jacket or case files. Climbing into her car, she turned the key and buckled her seatbelt in one fluid motion. She drove out into the night, aimlessly at first, but quickly finding clear direction. She pulled into the parking lot and killed the engine. Thunder rumbled overhead as she made her way to the stairwell, an omen of the momentous decision to come. Change was going to happen, one way or the other. Temperance Brennan refused to allow it to control her any longer. Raising her hand, she knocked at last on the door.


	2. Scotch & Sleeplessness

**A/N:** Here is the next installment, typed just for you during time that I should have spent practicing, so as to be able to enter college in my chosen major. Enjoy!

_--_

_I don't wanna leave you with perfume and promises_

_But we'll never know 'til we capture and bottle it_

'_Cause wouldn't it be such a shame_

_If all was wasted_

_--_

Her father, for Christ's sake. He would have to testify against her father when the morning came. He sat on the couch and stared at the television, his unseeing eyes not registering that it was, in fact, turned off. The bottle of scotch on his coffee table was half-empty, but he was nowhere near drunk. A numbness had settled in that had nothing to do with the drink and everything to do with the future he faced.

He would break her heart, something he had sworn never to do. It was his duty to testify against her father, part of his job, working tirelessly to protect the country he loved. A protection which, unfortunately, required him to testify against all criminals that he apprehended. The rational creature he had known a year or so ago would have understood that, but Temperance Brennan had changed. Her father's re-appearance had softened her, made her more open to things that couldn't be proven by theorems and experiments. She had begun to trust, in her own cautious way, poking her head out from under the blankets little by little. Max Keenan had changed her, and if he was honest with himself, so had he. For the first time in nearly 20 years, she was not alone, and she was finally beginning to see that. For some unfathomable reason, she trusted him, and he would rather be condemned by God to a life in hell than betray that trust.

Suddenly, it was not enough to think of his responsibility, of his duty. He wanted nothing more than to pick up and leave, to vanish into thin air and have nothing to do with this mess. He didn't want to watch his partner's life be torn apart once again, didn't want to face the hurricane that would envelope them all tomorrow. He was afraid of where they would stand when it was all over. There was a good possibility that they would never be the same again. The stars and stripes whipped in the wind outside his door, and he found himself cursing his country and all it stood for. America the beautiful, he thought darkly.

It changed in a heartbeat. Instantaneously, his thoughts snapped from the anger that he felt at the situation he had been forced into to _her._ He needed to see her, to hear her voice. To touch her and tell her that they would make it through. He needed to make her understand that no matter what happened, no matter what the world tried to do to them, he would be there. He had to show her that she was not alone, that all the progress she had made was worth it. He needed to fall with her, so that when they hit the ground, he would be able to find her again.

He downed another shot, feeling the fire that coursed through his veins in the form of alcohol. He tried to drown himself in the feeling, fighting everything that the world had placed on his shoulders. He thought longingly of the gun in the drawer beside his bed. One quick pull of the trigger, and all this would be over. He couldn't do that to her.

He hadn't been this far below the surface since he had come back from the war. For months, he had fallen, pulled apart at the seams. He'd gambled and drunk, fornicated and wallowed, trying to absolve himself, to escape the pain that threatened to consume him. He did not have that luxury this time. There was a moment, he decided, when everything would change. It all came down to one moment.

The clouds formed a circle in the sky above DC, a storm practically unparalleled in the history of the city. The streets in shadow, a single apartment at the center, in the eye of the storm. There was no going back, but the going forward was just as difficult. A knock came at the door, and for a single moment, the winds died and the thunder stopped. For a fraction of a lifetime, the whole world waited.


	3. Tonight & Tomorrow

**A/N:** That's a wrap, folks! This be the final installment.

_--_

_Not an inch of the room that isn't in bloom or in light_

_So we drink 'til it's dawn, every drip 'til it's gone and we're wasted_

_It's a thing of the truth but we'll lie and we'll look for the perfect escape_

_And the moment will go like melted snow in the rain_

--

He wasn't surprised when the door opened to reveal his partner. She wasn't surprised when he admitted her to his apartment wordlessly. They both knew why she was here. There was a point where words became unnecessary, and they had reached it. Toe to toe, they looked at each other, nothing in their eyes but acceptance and complete understanding. Utterly exposed to the other, neither felt the need to hide anymore. They teetered together on the edge of the precipice, locked in a moment for all eternity. And then they fell.

When they looked back on this night, neither would be able to tell who had moved first. Booth's hands wrapped around the back of his partner, pulling her impossibly close. Hers wound around his neck, tangling in his short hair and bringing his lips down to meet hers. The kiss was electric, restarting time from its standstill. Arms and legs were no longer, his lips were indistinguishable from hers, and they melded together. Desperately, they inhaled from each other's lungs, fighting the numbness with every fiber of their collective being. Together at last, despite all the odds. And if this could only be for now, if this feeling could only last for one night, then that would have to be enough. Booth held his partner snugly in his arms as the monumental kiss ended. For tonight, Temperance Brennan was his, and as long as she was, he would be okay.

Thunder rumbled above and the heavens opened. Rain cascaded down the windows, fallins in sheets and pooling in the low places. Tomorrow, the Potomac would be flooded, the streets would be slick, the sky would be gray, but the two in Booth's living room gave no thought to that. Tomorrow was why they were here, tomorrow was what they were avoiding. Their lips met again and lightning flashed. The wind wailed through the trees, the shutters on the houses rattled. Across the city, people waited for the impending dawn. The storm raged on around the apartment, but it was in the eye that the gale was the strongest. Desperately, its two victims clung to each other, holding, hurting, helping, loving in the only way they knew how. It was spectacular and messy, beautiful and earth-shattering. In the darkness, in the shadows of uncertainty and fear, in a place between the fire and the lightning, two became one.

--

_I don't wanna leave you with perfume and promises_

_But we'll never know 'til we capture and bottle it_

'_Cause wouldn't it be such a shame_

_If all was wasted_

--

As they lay upon Booth's bed, they held each other impossibly closer, dying for each other, for the indescribable need that they felt. Tomorrow was irrelevant, Brennan decided (rather irrationally), for as long as he was holding her like this.

Sleep didn't come that night, but it would have been a rather unwelcome guest, had it come knocking. Both felt the approaching dawn, and the urgency that it imparted caused them only to hold tighter, to kiss harder, to love more deeply. Wild abandon overtook them, heated them like iron and left them to cool. Wave-tossed and thrown asunder, nothing else mattered.

--

_Stay for another morning_

_Study the curves of my face_

_Stay even when we're unknowing_

_Stay 'til they tear you away_

--

Inevitably, dawn came, and with it, a return to themselves. They could no longer pretend that they could avoid it. The time came, and with it, a grim acceptance. No words were spoken as they dressed for the day. To speak would only illustrate how useless words had become. The night was over, living only in memory. It flowed from the apartment and melted in the rain. The time for emotion had passed, and now it was time for atonement.

"It meant something." He whispered into her hair, as he held her for what he knew could very possibly be the last time. "Whether we choose to accept it, whether we ever talk about it again. If it all goes to hell today, if we aren't strong enough to outlast it, we will always remember this night. Whether we choose to just go on from here, floating wherever the wind wills us to go, this can't be erased. From now on, everything that happens to us, either of us, both of us. If there's even any difference anymore. Everything we do for the rest of our lives will come back to this one night." She twisted in his arms, allowing herself to melt into his embrace for one last stolen moment before she pulled away.

"Whatever happens," she whispered, her hand flat against his chest, her fingers brushing the cavity where his heart lay beating. "Que sera sera. What will be will be."

--

_I don't wanna leave you with perfume and promises_

_But we'll never know 'til we capture and bottle it_

'_Cause wouldn't it be such a shame_

_If all was wasted_


End file.
